SIMON SAYS – My 3 Best Bets week 3

Morris lays down the gauntlet

Champion jockey Luke Morris has made a determined start to the third All-Weather Championships with five winners in the opening week, including a notable big race double on the opening day at Lingfield Park. Morris, who rode three winners in all, scored in the first Fast Track Qualifier of the season on Lamar in the Listed Fleur De Lys Stakes and took the feature handicap on Marco Botti’s progressive Crazy Chic.

Lamar’s deserved victory ahead of a possible trip to stud completed a Listed double for Newmarket trainer James Tate whose strike rate in the opening week was bettered only by fellow Headquarters handler James Fanshawe. He took the Listed Floodlit Stakes at Kempton on Wednesday with the improving mare Missed Call, who definitely stays in training.

Whilst Missed Call could emerge as a contender for the Marathon Final, Charlie Appleby’s Anglophile heads back to the track at Chelmsford City on Friday evening en route to another intended tilt at the Lingfield showpiece. The four-year-old only just failed to peg back Mymatechris in last season’s two-mile final and looks the one to beat back in a handicap on his first start since being given a summer break.

Meanwhile, the All-Weather Championships celebrated an international success at Wolverhampton in midweek when the German-trained Nice Story won a low-grade mile and a half handicap on the Tapeta. Rudolf Storp’s mare was given a fine ride by Jimmy Quinn to defy a mark of just 50 and might be able to follow up under a penalty at Chelmsford next week.

Appleby sprinter set to strike

Mick Appleby is a past master when it comes to improving other people’s cast offs and can strike again with the speedy LOUMARIN in the five-furlong apprentice handicap (4.35) at the Essex track on Friday. This filly made a promising start for the Newark handler at Wolverhampton last month but couldn’t maintain some searching fractions over six furlongs.